Water Curing Some Bud

Some background: I was hit by mold this year, hard. I harvested all the clearly mold-free buds, but was left with some buds that while being mold free themselves, were next to moldy buds or has small patches of mold which I removed, but were otherwise healthy. I decided to try water curing. I first washed the buds in a 4 stage wash, warm water + hydrogen peroxide, warm water + baking soda and lemon juice, hot water, cold water. Then I jarred the buds, submerged them in distilled water, and changed the water every day for 7 days. Now I have drained them and they are currently drying. I will have magnified pics to see if trichomes remained intact and a smoke report as soon as they are dry. Until then, here are the pics.

Day 1:

Day 2:

Day 3:

Day 5:

Day 7:

Drying:

The blue/pink things on the tray are a silica gel desiccant. There is also a fan circulating air over them.

you should send a sample to get tested. I would like to know if water curing truly cleans the herb.

Farmer's Hat said:

you should send a sample to get tested. I would like to know if water curing truly cleans the herb.

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There is a lab less than 15 miles from my house, any idea how much that costs? I was thinking it would be fun to have some samples tested for both potency and cleanliness, but I don't sell and am growing to save money so I don't have much extra cash for expensive testing. If it's in the $100+ range it's not really worth it for me, its not a ton of money until you really need it hahaha

Water curing is different.
A few things you will notice are;
Your buds will dry faster than fresh buds. Be careful, don't let them get too crispy.
There will be significantly less weight than with a normal dry/cure. Don't worry though the THC will be concentrated. Less mass, same THC content.

The smell and taste are pretty much gone. Not much expansion or feeling in your throat. Good for smoking in a park or something but it makes me feel like something's missing. Smell and taste make up a lot of the experience for me. Water curing removes terpenes, which are water soluble, and are responsible for taste, smell, psychoactive interaction, and medicinal properties.
BUT, it is a perfect way to save unusable bud or to get a quickr quality check.

It will most likely be under 100. Check it out when you get the chance.

Keep us posted.

polo the don said:

Water curing is different.
A few things you will notice are;
Your buds will dry faster than fresh buds. Be careful, don't let them get too crispy.
There will be significantly less weight than with a normal dry/cure. Don't worry though the THC will be concentrated. Less mass, same THC content.

The smell and taste are pretty much gone. Not much expansion or feeling in your throat. Good for smoking in a park or something but it makes me feel like something's missing. Smell and taste make up a lot of the experience for me. Water curing removes terpenes, which are water soluble, and are responsible for taste, smell, psychoactive interaction, and medicinal properties.
BUT, it is a perfect way to save unusable bud or to get a quickr quality check.

Click to expand...

Nice! You seem to know a bit about it, so let me ask this: I as of yet have not water cured any buds that have themselves had signs of mold, but I keep seeing it brought up as a good salvage technique. Can I actually throw buds that have some mold on them in and the water will remove the mold by the end of the cycle? I am thinking maybe yes, especially with the antiseptic pre-washing, but something about smoking a bud that i know for a fact used to have mold on it made me a little queasy so i haven't done it. But it would be nice to know if it is an option, i have some very pretty nugs still on the branches that I was going to chuck in the bin because they have a bit of mold here and there, but if the mold will come out and leave smokable product I see no reason to cure them, I could get a couple ounces extra salvaged if its possible.

Ace Yonder said:

Nice! You seem to know a bit about it, so let me ask this: I as of yet have not water cured any buds that have themselves had signs of mold, but I keep seeing it brought up as a good salvage technique. Can I actually throw buds that have some mold on them in and the water will remove the mold by the end of the cycle? I am thinking maybe yes, especially with the antiseptic pre-washing, but something about smoking a bud that i know for a fact used to have mold on it made me a little queasy so i haven't done it. But it would be nice to know if it is an option, i have some very pretty nugs still on the branches that I was going to chuck in the bin because they have a bit of mold here and there, but if the mold will come out and leave smokable product I see no reason to cure them, I could get a couple ounces extra salvaged if its possible.

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I honestly don't know about the mold issue. I did it out of curiosity the first time and keep a lil water cured around for stealth smoking.

From what I've read it IS a good way to salvage bud from mold, mites, and other issues. Makes sense to me that your prewash plus water curing should do the trick.

I water cured a few time last year.
Smooths out smoke, no taste or smell though
all bag appeal gone
I did it to make edibles, I hate the "green" taste, worked fine
that reminds me, I still have a jar of water cured from
last year in pantry.......
think I'll twist one & try again.
As for using to remove mold this way, I don't know...

good luck & have fun

So some of the buds have dried enough to smoke, and I gotta say, I love it. I love everything about it, so much smoother on my throat, and the smell is still present in a very subtle, hardly noticeable way. I even love the way they look, to my eye the bag appeal was hardly diminished, perhaps even improved. The buds feel denser too. Maybe it's because I water cured them fresh without drying them first, but either way I am stoked at the results, and I'm gonna harvest the rest of my sketchy bud tomorrow and wash and water cure it all. Here are some pics of two water cured nugs next to some air curing bud from the same crop. The water cured ones are the darker ones. I really like the way they look, but maybe I'm just weird haha

Trichomes remained remarkably intact as well!

My question is can you make oil from it then? Making butter sounds good because you wouldn't have the chlorophyll taste. Not much taste at all. Could be dangerous. Lol. How about bho? Old weed doesn't bho well.

For cooking, I prefer using water cured bud. The green taste is greatly reduced!